And perhaps it would be best if the other never came back.

I could have made the world better worth living in if I had had the chance--and I wouldn't have been a duchess! La! La!" She relapsed into reverie, an uncommon experience for her; and her mind floated indefinitely from one thing to another, while she was half conscious of the smell of coffee permeating the air, and of the low resonant notes of the Nubian boys, as, with locked shoulders, they scrubbed the decks of a dahabieh near by with hempshod feet.
Presently, however, she was conscious of another sound--the soft clip of oars, joined to the guttural, explosive song of native rowers; and, leaning over the rail, she saw a boat draw alongside the Nefert.

From it came the figure of Nahoum Pasha, who stepped briskly on deck, in his handsome face a light which flashed an instant meaning to her.
"I know--I know! Claridge Pasha--you have heard ?" she said excitedly, as he came to her.
He smiled and nodded.

"A messenger has arrived.

Within a few hours he should be here." "Then it was all false that he was wounded--ah, that horrible story of his death!" "Bismillah, it was not all false! The night before the great battle he was slightly wounded in the side.